


Dependent on the Strength of the Forest

by the_rck



Category: Dreaming of Sunshine - Silver Queen
Genre: Gen, Impersonation, Infiltration, Silver Queen's Dreaming of Sunshine Universe, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28726782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_rck/pseuds/the_rck
Summary: Tenzou suspected that Shikako would have-- eventually-- put the targeting error down to some sort of space-time fuuinjutsu gravitational force. Then she'd probably speculate about what else might have been pulled in and whether or not compensation might be possible next time she needed to navigate time.Tenzou, Kisuke, and Kakashi were supposed to make sure Nara Shikako grew up without ever needing to think about emergency, rush job, last ditch gamble, might destroy the universe, time travel seals. Or, really, any sort of time travel seals at all.Shikako probably still would because because that was how her mind worked, but she wouldn'tneedto.
Comments: 18
Kudos: 233
Collections: Dreaming of Sunshine Exchange 2020 C (Winter Round!), Heliocentrism — a Dreaming of Sunshine recursive collection





	Dependent on the Strength of the Forest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DawningStar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawningStar/gifts).



"I can't be the infiltrator, not the public one," Kakashi told Tenzou, "and Kisuke would be even worse."

"I _know_ , senpai," Tenzou responded, trying not to let his irritation show. "I was listening the first three times you said it." He gave Kakashi a hard look.

Kakashi shrugged. "It's a good plan for a five minute rethink."

It was. Tenzou knew it. He just wasn't confident about his ability to carry it all off without time to practice. The mokuton parts would be easy. He was considerably more worried about the impersonation and lying. He had expected to have time to ease into that part.

He'd also expected to be making his first approach during a period of-- relative-- peace.

"Be arrogant," Kisuke told him. "Mokuton is a gift from the gods, and Senju Tenzou doesn't know he took a century or two to master it." He frowned and reached an intangible hand toward Tenzou's jacket. "You're going to have to be naked."

"It's hard to be arrogant _and_ naked," Tenzou said. He knew Kisuke was right, though. All of them were dressed differently than the locals, enough so to provoke suspicion. Two decades mattered, and even if they hadn't, nothing Tenzou had on could pass for pre-Founding. Tenzou sighed. "I can just say my things didn't survive me fusing with the trees." He started to strip. "It makes me look less powerful. Well, or less practiced."

"I have faith in you." Kakashi's hand twitched, and Tenzou was almost certain that the man wanted to ruffle Tenzou's hair and to call him a 'cute little genin.'

Kakashi missed his students, and, while they were all alive in the now, he wasn't ever getting them back.

Tenzou wasn't sure if he ought to let Kakashi turn him into a stand-in for the real Team 7 or if that would just make a bigger mess.

Tenzou would ask Kisuke. Later.

Tenzou supposed that there was something wrong when the dead guy was the most emotionally functional member of the team.

"It's not bad for making changes on the fly!" Kakashi added cheerfully. "Shikako would be proud!"

Tenzou nodded. He could have pointed out that Shikako would also have been very busy trying to figure out why their temporal targeting had gone wrong, but he didn't want Kakashi to realize that his efforts to be encouraging were failing.

Shikako had said they'd have three months before the Kyuubi. "The Yondaime will listen to Kakashi-sensei," she'd told the three of them. "Tenzou-sempai, if it comes to that, you can help hold the Kyuubi. Maboroshi-san--" She had stopped and had shaken her head.

"I map every root," Kisuke had answered. "Both Danzo's nin and Madara's plant things, so that we can burn out every trace of the infection."

Tenzou had gotten the impression, in that moment, that Shikako had told Kisuke things she hadn't shared with the living members of the strike force. He still hadn't thought of any way to pry those secrets out of Kisuke.

Shikako had probably had a good reason not to share them with Tenzou and Kakashi, but the situation had changed vastly.

They were supposed to have three months. Instead, they'd arrived at the very instant that Uzumaki Naruto became Konoha's jinchuriki. They could see the distant, burning buildings and smell the smoke and dust

Tenzou suspected that Shikako would have-- eventually-- put the targeting error down to some sort of space-time fuuinjutsu gravitational force. Then she'd probably speculate about what else might have been pulled in and whether or not compensation might be possible next time she needed to navigate time.

Tenzou, Kisuke, and Kakashi were supposed to make sure Nara Shikako grew up without ever needing to think about emergency, rush job, last ditch gamble, might destroy the universe, time travel seals. Or, really, any sort of time travel seals at all.

Shikako probably still would because because that was how her mind worked, but she wouldn't _need_ to.

Possibly, just possibly, Kakashi wasn't the only person who missed Shikako.

When Tenzou was completely naked, he knelt and put both hands, palm down, on the ground. He felt every flicker of plant life between where they were and where a newborn howled his displeasure at the unkindness of the world.

"I can get there from here," Tenzou said. It would be easier if they got closer, but he thought all of them already knew that.

And all of them already knew the risks of getting closer.

"Don't be seen," Tenzou told Kakashi. Tenzou expected Kakashi to understand that as teasing. Tenzou hoped that Kakashi understood it as teasing.

If Shikako had said it-- if Shikako had been there to say it-- Kakashi would have understood it as teasing.

Tenzou didn't look at Kakashi to see how he had reacted. Instead, Tenzou sank into the soil and reached for the nearest tree. The movement became easier when he was following living wood, but the transition between earth only and earth and wood together hurt a little.

Tenzou would have to make that transition 27 times before he reached the Hashirama tree next to the Yondaime's cooling corpse.

He was very glad that Kakashi wasn't going to have to see his mentor's body again.

Tenzou's movement stuttered as it occurred to him that Kakashi's younger self was definitely still going to see Namikaze Minato's corpse tonight. Another mission objective impossible.

Each tree tried to pull Tenzou inside. Each tree resisted when he left it behind. The resistance got stronger with each transition, and Tenzou thought that might be why so many Senju with weak mokuton had vanished into the forests, why they sometimes wandered back out months, years, even decades later. 

The embrace of the living wood offered timeless peace and safety. Losing himself that way would be so much easier than trying to fix the world.

Tenzou let go of one tree so that he could swing through the soil to the roots of the next. He was halfway there.

The worst part, the hardest part, was letting his target tree swallow him entirely. That felt permanent. The tree wanted it to be permanent. Humans with mokuton were bothersome, too much in a hurry, too likely to make demands.

But Tenzou had to step out from the trunk. He couldn't leave any uncertainty, any possibility that he might have emerged from the ground.

When Tenzou came out of the tree, he saw the Sandaime kneeling beside an unmoving body. There were other bodies lying in the wreckage. Most of them also weren't moving. Tenzou scanned his surroundings, looking for bright red hair or golden.

He didn't spot either immediately. There was so much damage to the area that he was surprised that the tree he'd used was still intact and serene. He leaned back against the trunk and reached for the accent he'd practiced.

Shikako had started to explain something about vowel shifts and softening consonants. Then she'd stopped and said, "Nobody you talk to will actually know what the language sounded like. Be consistent." She'd looked thoughtful and raised a hand with her thumb and forefinger only a little bit apart. "A bit of Mist in it to account for the Uzumaki in the family. I'm not sure how to filter out the Uchiha, though." She'd shrugged. "I suppose you could just say that you dreamed the village while you were a tree."

Tenzou cleared his throat. "Where has the forest gone?" he asked. He made each consonant hard and distinct and put as much imperious demand into the question as he could. "Who has built on Senju lands?" He thought he sounded ridiculous, and he was sure someone was going to start laughing.

The Sandaime turned to look at Tenzou. He didn't speak. He didn't signal. He simply studied Tenzou.

Okay, Tenzou wasn't going to die immediately. He could do this. He could totally do this. He cocked his head, listening to Naruto's wailing.

The baby was... There.

Tenzou pulled a tree out of the earth beneath himself and grew it around his hips, just enough for modesty.

Just enough to underline that what he was doing had to be mokuton. The Sandaime would recognize it.

Tenzou walked carefully through the debris until he found the baby. 

"Don't." The Sandaime's voice carried clear command and clear threat of violence.

Tenzou tried for puzzlement as he turned to look at Sarutobi Hiruzen. "There's a baby on the ground. Someone should--" He waved a hand in Naruto's direction. Then Tenzou held up both hands and took a step back. "Infanticide is barbaric." He twisted disapproval into the words. "And looking at all of this--" He turned a full circle to take in every fragment of destruction. "I assumed need for rescue."

The Sandaime braced one hand on his knee and levered himself to his feet. "Never-the-less, Senju-san. I will carry the child. Please do me the honor of carrying my wife's body."

His wife? Tenzou didn't remember anything about the Sandaime's wife. Tenzou supposed he'd always known that Sarutobi Asuma had to have had a mother, but she'd never been relevant before. Tenzou gave himself a fraction of a second to consider.

The Sandaime moved like he'd been hurt, physically. Cracked ribs, possibly. He might be able to carry his wife, but Tenzou would have an easier time of it. The Sandaime carrying the jinchuriki instead could be put down to him protecting a vulnerable village asset.

Also, carrying a corpse with any degree of respect would limit Tenzou's ability to attack.

Tenzou reminded himself that he wasn't supposed to recognize the Sandaime. Tenzou shouldn't even know the man's clan. He offered a polite bow as to a stranger. "Of course, ojii-san." He thought he could put respect for the dead ahead of demanding-- again-- to know how there came to be a village here or what had caused the destruction around them.

Tenzou picked his way through the debris toward the Sandaime and toward what had to be the body of the Sandaime's wife. Tenzou considered growing geta for himself. It seemed practical given his surroundings, but he wasn't sure whether him doing that might be disrespectful of the dead by the standards of pre-Founding Senju.

Mokuton was a gift from the gods.

Tenzou made himself geta as he walked. He also grew a branch of sakura and pushed it to blossom profusely. When he knelt by the old woman's body, he placed the branch on her chest before he lifted her into his arms.

The Sandaime nodded at Tenzou then went to retrieve Naruto.

The baby. Tenzou couldn't call him Naruto, not until someone told him that was the baby's name. There were so many things Tenzou had to not know in order to pull off his role.

"Just make them explain everything," Shikako had told him. She'd said it as if it was an easy thing to do. "Don't talk about things if you're not sure what you should or shouldn't know." She'd frowned. "Being a tree for decades should justify memory loss."

Tenzou waited until the Sandaime had picked up Na-- the baby-- and started walking in the direction of the Hokage's Tower. Tenzou followed about ten paces behind. He hoped that the distance would be taken as respect rather than as a strong desire not to have the Sandaime's bodyguards-- Surely he must have bodyguards? --murder him for looking too threatening.

It was three days before anyone got around to questioning Tenzou. They didn't even lock him up. He'd offered help in rescue efforts by pointing out that he could move a lot of rubble without risking collapse.

The Sandaime had looked him up and down and assigned a team of Hyuuga to work with him.

Tenzou thought that was an astute choice. The Hyuuga could find people and direct his efforts. There was even a chance they could take him down if he slipped and revealed himself to be an enemy or a spy.

They were giving him enough wire to snare himself.

He hadn't been able to get near Naruto, but the Sandaime also hadn't revealed Naruto's status as jinchuriki to the village at large. Tenzou suspected that his own presence factored into that.

If 'Senju Tenzou' was a spy, letting him know the identity of Konoha's jinchuriki would go a long way past imprudence. 

Tenzou hoped that it would help. Making life better for tiny Uzumaki Naruto wasn't the point, but Shikako had asked them to try.

Which, now that Tenzou thought about it, implied she hadn't really been sure they'd be able to change anything before Naruto was born.

As he sat across the table from a Yamanaka he didn't recognize, Tenzou hoped desperately that the seals Shikako had given him and Kakashi really would conceal everything from a mindwalk.

She'd looked at them both seriously and said, "I can set these up two ways. The first is, if they break, the interrogator gets everything. The second is, if they break, your mind melts. I don't have time to make a toggle." She'd made a face. "I'd rather have my brain melt than have Danzo pull me apart, but they're not all going to be Danzo. I'm not even sure--" She'd looked questioningly at Tenzou. "--did Root agents have seals that far back?"

Tenzou hadn't known. He still didn't know. 

He'd chosen the suicide option because he was never going back to Danzo. Tenzou hadn't asked what Kakashi had chosen. Tenzou didn't intend to ask. Ever.

"I think I understand, Yamanaka-san," Tenzou said. He put uncertainty into the words in an effort to sound as if he didn't entirely believe that a mindwalk was possible, as if he'd never heard of such a thing. "If it will make all of you happier about me being here, then I guess. I really-- How can my clan be _gone_? I can't-- I wasn't gone _that_ long."

"Never-the-less," Yamanaka Tsuki told him. "Look at my eyes and relax. It will all be over soon."

Tenzou was relieved that he was getting the friendlier version of interrogation. He took a few deep breaths and thought about being a tree. He knew what that felt like now, all of the ways that it was terrifying and all of the ways it was tempting. He thought that might be an even better way to hide his secrets than Shikako's seal. 

Tenzou met the woman's eyes and let her find the tree inside him. Time meant nothing to the tree, so it meant nothing to Tenzou or his interrogator. 

Seven hours later, a team of Yamanaka had to intervene to pull Yamanaka Tsuki out of Tenzou's mind. She needed several hours after that to fully reintegrate her awareness to a human perspective.

Those hours were unpleasant for Tenzou, but he'd spent worse nights. Being able to withdraw into his inner tree helped considerably.

No one tried a mindwalk after that, and no one questioned that Tenzou was a Senju who had been a tree for a very, very long time, either.

Time meant nothing to the tree, so Tenzou's moments of fusion felt almost infinitely long. Because he'd realized that the tree he'd emerged from wasn't actually old enough to match his story, he'd given the woman impressions of moving from root to root and of being a tree in between. He didn't think she'd realized that it was the same tree every time.

Trees were too alien to how the Yamanaka thought. Tenzou suspected he'd have been more at risk from an Aburame or a Nara or-- possibly-- a Kurama. Very fortunate for Tenzou that none of them had sat in.

He felt a little bad that Yamanaka Tsuki might never get the tree out of her head entirely. He was pretty sure that her clan techniques would at least keep her aware of what was her and what wasn't even human.

He apologized to her profusely after and asked if he could take her to dinner as an apology. "Hokage-sama said my clan has money here, so I think I can afford it." He rubbed the back of his head. "Or maybe I can work construction for a few days. Mokuton makes things sturdy."

She smiled. "I know some places that are still open." She didn't say Akimichi, so Tenzou pretended he didn't know.

The food would be good, and Tenzou would be able to ask a lot of questions. He was in this for the long haul, and nothing in the plan required him to do anything suspicious. Yet.

Tsuki wouldn't be the only person watching him and reporting back to the Hokage, but Tenzou thought he might as well make it easy for T&I to track him. He and Tsuki could discuss trees from a perspective no one else had. 

No experienced Yamanaka would miss that potential hook, and T&I would never leave it unexploited.

Tenzou would use that as a lever in turn. He was starting to think that Shikako and Kakashi were right; Tenzou could do this.


End file.
